A good play, suggests Tony Kushner in his 1995 anthology Thinking About the Longstanding Problems of Virtue, “should be overstuffed.” Memorably comparing well-constructed theater to lasagna, he writes that a work of theater “should have barely been rescued from the mess it might just as easily have been” and, at its best, “has a bursting […]
Tag: About Face Theatre
Posted inTheater Review
Laced has echoes of Stonewall and Pulse
Sam Mueller’s Laced lives in the shadow of the Pulse nightclub mass shooting, but it is rooted in a club that preceded Pulse by several generations: Stonewall. Through Mueller’s monologue-dependent script, About Face Theatre creates a contemporary story that also gives voice to the history that helped forge it. In director Lexi Saunders’s raw, emotive […]
Posted inCity Life
Jump into spring with these Chicagoland events
The spring equinox (the moment when the sun is exactly above the equator and day and night are of equal length) for this year starts at 10:33 AM on Sunday 3/20, and brings our chance to check out Chicagohenge (if you go to the Loop, you might see the sun framed by our skyscrapers). And […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Collective healing
Queer bars are more than just bars that happen to be queer. They can be a refuge, a meeting place, and, quite literally, a safe space. They’re also places where our history has been written: from the Stonewall riots to the Pulse Nightclub shooting. Sam Mueller’s latest production unpacks what happens when the safety and […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Pride 2021: picnics, music, boat races, and (digital) performances
The parade’s postponed till October, but you can still celebrate Pride outdoors and online this month.
Posted inArts & Culture
About Face turns 25 by nurturing the next generation of LGBTQ+ artists
About Face Theatre takes the mystery out of training next-generation LGBTQ+ artists—while putting it into a streaming production.
Posted inArts & Culture
Retail, resistance, and rebirth in Wally World and Kickback
Christmas Eve goes to 11 in Isaac Gómez’s workplace comedy; About Face celebrates Black queer lives, past and present.
Posted inArts & Culture
From Greenhouse to hotbed
A show reopens and closes under fire; plus new leadership and a new funding initiative for Black theater makers
Posted inArts & Culture
COVID can’t stop the Pride celebration
This year, queer performers dismantle digital boundaries while creating their own spaces.
Posted inArts & Culture
A couple faces a becalmed relationship in The Gulf
About Face’s two-hander boasts stellar performances.
Posted inArts & Culture
Packing follows one gay man’s journey to confront his midwestern ghosts
Scott Bradley’s solo show for About Face creates an important document of queer life.
Posted inArts & Culture
20/20 celebrates being young, gifted, and queer
About Face Youth Theatre turns 20 with this contemporary look at LGBTQ history.
Posted inArts & Culture
Dada Woof Papa Hot shows that modern parenthood’s not just for straight people
“Isn’t being normal the most radical thing of all?” God no!
Posted inArts & Culture
An interracial couple struggles with differing levels of activism in This Bitter Earth
Harrison David Rivers’s new play looks at love in the time of Black Lives Matter.
Posted inArts & Culture
LGBTQ young people reimagine their autobiographies as Scary Stories to Save Your Life
Vampires, stalkers, monsters, and other horrors included.